Tag Archives: Gospel of Jesus’ Wife

It seemed real; it seemed fake; it seemed real again; now we’re back to fake.

“It” is the controversial little scrap of papyrus, written in Coptic, that seems to have Jesus referring to “my wife,” in contrast to the traditional stance that affirms Jesus’ perpetual bachelorhood.

The quick backstory: In 2012, a Harvard professor, Karen King, brought this papyrus to the attention of scholars and the public.

Both the material and the script looked authentically ancient at first glance, and though the notion of Jesus having a wife was remarkable, these “lost” Christian writings, such as the Gnostic Gospels, are full of unorthodoxies.

(This article was co-authored with Joel Baden of Yale Divinity School. It summarizes the work of many distinguished scholars including Mark Goodacre from whom we received permission to use the image in the piece)

Scholars had concluded that a papyrus referring to Jesus’s wife was a clever forgery—until new evidence re-opened the case. Is there any way to figure out the truth?

In September 2012 Karen King, Hollis Professor of Divinity at Harvard Divinity School, announced the discovery of a new Coptic manuscript that she titled The Gospel of Jesus’ Wife (GJW).

The revelation was met with a firestorm of media attention. The mobile-phone-sized scrap of papyrus contained the words “Jesus said to them, ‘my wife…’” before breaking off. In a subsequent line the fragment refers to a “Mary” and says that she “is worthy.” Worthy of what? To be a disciple? And, if so, is this about women priests? Is this Mary Magdalene? Do we finally have independent evidence to confirm the groundbreaking findings of TheDa Vinci Code?